1. Technical Field
The inventive arrangements relate generally to methods and apparatus providing advanced operating features for audio only, video only and both video and audio programs recorded on disc media, for example recordable digital video discs, hard drives and magneto optical discs.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various devices have been developed to enable consumers to record video and/or audio programs for later presentation. Such devices include tape recorders, video cassette recorders, recordable compact discs, and most recently, recordable digital video discs (DVD). Hard drives and magneto optical discs have also been used.
A DVD that can be recorded on only once, and thereafter is essentially a DVD read only memory, is referred to by the acronym DVD-R. The acronym DVD-R is also used generally to refer to the write-once, or record-once, technology. Several formats are available for DVD's to be recorded on, erased and re-recorded; that is, overwritten or rewritten. These are referred to by the acronyms DVD-RAM, DVD-RW and DVD+RW. As of this time no uniform industry standard has been adopted. The acronyms DVD-RAM, DVD-RW and DVD+RW are also used generally to refer to the respective rewritable technologies. Reference herein to rewritable DVD technology, devices and methods is generally intended to encompass all of the standards which are now being used, as well as those which may be developed in the future.
In many cases, the program presentations are recorded in the viewer and/or listener's absence, for presentation at a later, more convenient time. This is referred to as time shifting the program. At other times, a program is being viewed and/or listened to without being recorded, and with out any interest in a recording, but the viewer's and/or listener's attention is interrupted, for example by a telephone call or an unexpected visitor. If the viewer and/or listener is watching a television program, for example, and has a cassette tape in a VCR, or can retrieve and load such a cassette tape quickly, the program can be recorded. However, the viewer and/or listener cannot view and/or listen to the program in its entirety, and in a proper time sequence, until after the recording has been completed. The time to completion of the recording can be short or long, depending on the length of the program.
Although rewritable DVD technology is generally available, operation is limited to such basic functions as play, record, fast forward reverse and stop. Pause is available, but only as a counterpart to pause operation in a VCR, for example interrupting the play back of a prerecorded program or interrupting the recording of a viewed program to eliminate commercials from the recording. Unlike computer hard drives, recordable DVD devices have a very significant additional function, which is playing back prerecorded DVD's. Thus, there is an economic incentive to develop rewritable DVD technology, including methods and devices, that can be used instead of a computer hard drive. It is a challenge to provide such devices with improved, advantageous features without compromising the goal of decreasing costs and increasing sales.
DVD technology allows the use of a variety of advanced features, including for example the ability to seamlessly branch from one part of a video presentation to another. In order to accommodate this, as well as other advanced features, the DVD-Video standard permits on-screen menus to be used. The menus permit users to control the video presentation by activating buttons appearing on a display screen. For example, menus allow users to navigate through the various video presentation contained on a disc, select from multiple programs, select different versions of the video presentation on the disc, and operate other advanced DVD features. Menus can also be used to navigate through interactive video programing which may be provided on the disc. The DVD standard also permits the use of sub-menus which may offer the user other control or selection options beyond what may be available in a main menu.
Menus play a key role in navigation of a disk. However, for a real-time recording device, such as DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-RAM and Streamer, just name a few, it is very difficult to prepare and record menus in real-time. In particular, the creation of a menu normally requires a user to know certain information. For example, a menu for navigating through a series of video presentations or recordings requires the user to know what the video presentation will be. Such information is necessary in order to properly identify each such presentation in the menu description or in text associated with the navigation buttons. However, users often do not know what they will record on a disk prior to such recording. Further, creation of a menu requires a user to know in advance where on the disc a particular presentation is recorded. Without such information, it is impossible to identify the location on the disc to which a button should cause the DVD player to jump when activated.
Going back after various video recording sessions to insert a menu is also a problem. Such an approach requires a user to play back or jump through the recorded video to try to locate the particular presentation to which a navigation button will cause the player to jump. Since the exact location of the desired video presentation is unknown, this can be a very tedious process.